Mikael Carleheden and Christian Borch: Editorial: Successive Modernities
Peter Wagner: Successive Modernities and the Idea of Progress: A First Attempt
The idea that modern society is not a unique institutional arrangement, functionally and normatively superior to all others, but that plural forms of modernity may exist is by now rather widely accepted. Its implications for a social theory and political philosophy that keeps normative concerns alive and aims to articulate them with socio-political analysis, however, are often unclear. Embracing the concept of plural modernities is often seen to entail the abandoning of normative concerns that ultimately are universal and unique, not plural and particular. This article first briefly discusses one central strand of ongoing historico-sociological research, the ‘multiple modernities’ debate, and argues that normative concerns about relativism that emerged from this debate have not been conclusively addressed. Subsequently, it is shown that the plurality of modernity that results from historical transformations of modernity, from ‘successive modernities’ (Johann Arnason), is of a different kind. Concerns about progress can be more fruitfully addressed because the point of reference is ‘the same modernity’ that transforms in time through the structuring activities of its own members. The search for the dynamics of ‘succession’ within modernity leads to a re-assessment of the notions of crisis and critique and the link between them. Such re-connection is elaborated in more detail by using Axel Honneth’s attempt at formulating a novel, empirically rich and historically situated theory of justice as the theoretical object against the backdrop of which a reconsideration of the idea of progress can take place with the insights from comparative-historical sociology in hand.
Keywords: Johann Arnason; crisis; critique; Axel Honneth; inclusion; individualization; modernity; progress.
Magnus Wennerhag: SAnother Modernity is Possible? The Global Justice Movement and the Transformations of Politics
Using and expanding upon the conception of ‘successive modernities’ that has recently been developed within social theory, this article offers an interpretation of the political aims, ideas, and practices of the ‘global justice movement’ and argues that this contemporary social movement is best understood as an expression of the tensions characterizing the prevailing configuration of Western modernity in our own time. Social movements have often simultaneously challenged, changed, and sustained the institutions, norms, and habits of modern societies. Placing the global justice movement in this historical context, the author elaborates how the notion of the creative capacities of social movements has hitherto been discussed in several major theories about social movements and modernity. The article argues that the movements mobilized since the 1990s in response to issues related to globalization should neither be seen as revolts against the demise of ‘organized modernity’, nor as heralding a new type of Western modernity. Instead, the critique and political claims of the global justice movement are, according to the author, better interpreted as expressing a will to realize a ‘third modernity’ in an alternative way that stresses the values of participatory democracy, democratization of international economic institutions, and the strengthening of social equality on a global level. Thus, the movement should foremost be seen as articulating a crisis in the forms of politics and democracy during our present epoch of modernity.
Keywords: Crisis; critique; globalization; global justice movement; individualization; modernity; participatory democracy; social movements; successive modernities.
Mikael Carleheden: The Imaginary Significations of Modernity: A Re-Examination
This article deals with the concept of modernity upon which one of the most interesting contemporary theories about modern social change is based – Peter Wagner’s theory of successive modernities. Wagner understands modernity as a double imaginary signification which entails a basic tension between liberty and discipline. This conception is almost directly taken from Cornelius Castoriadis. I argue that this tension exists in two versions in Castoriadis’ philosophy and that the two versions are incompatible. It is further claimed that the two versions reappear in Wagner’s theory, which makes his theory of successive modernities partly inconsistent. A stance is taken for one of these versions and it is argued that the theory of successive modernities should appropriate that version as its point of departure in order to grasp the history of modernity in a consistent way.
Keywords: Cornelius Castoriadis; modernity; social change; successive modernities; Peter Wagner.
Anders la Cour: Amateur Hour is Over
Across Europe, there has been growing enthusiasm for the inclusion of voluntary organizations in welfare work. This article shows that this results in a new politics of voluntarism in a Danish social policy context. The communication of various organizations taken together constitutes the self-referential communication of a hybrid ‘third-order’ organization. Using key notions drawn from the work of Niklas Luhmann, the article explores how the communication of what Gunther Teubner has called the ‘many-headed hydra’ of such organizations can be understood. In the case of voluntary social work, communication rests on an undisputed distinction between professionalism and amateurism that fosters a number of paradoxes. These paradoxes are shown to be constitutive of voluntary social work itself.
Keywords: Amateurism; deconstruction; politics; professionalization; systems theory; voluntary social work.
Henning Bech, Christian Borch and Steen Nepper Larsen: Resistance, Politics, Space, Architecture: Interview with Nigel Thrift
This interview was conducted in Copenhagen on January 23rd 2010 after Professor Nigel Thrift’s keynote lecture on ‘Life World Inc.’, delivered at the Danish Sociological Congress. The interview takes as its starting point Professor Thrift’s lecture but soon moves on to a broader discussion of resistance, politics, space, and architecture, among other things.
Keywords: Architecture; mobility; neuroscience; politics; resistance; Sloterdijk; space.